Summer 2008 Trip: Istanbul

What can I say about the world’s “most magnificently situated” city that hasn’t already been said? Not that much. Instead of recalling the minutiae of my visit, I think I’d rather just share some never-before-posted photos…

Summer 2008 Trip: Odessa to Istanbul

The Caledonia

The cabin

I was the first one to arrive to my cabin on the Caledonia, a clean and simple setup with four berths. I dropped my bags on an upper berth and walked around the boat a while before returning. Seated on one of the lower berths was a middle-aged man with a comb over that told me his name was Ibrahim. Speaking Russian, he asked me my name and where I was from. When I told him I was American, his eyes widened. I asked him were he was from and he handed me some sort of identification card. Two things instantly stood out: the word “Mosul” and the Iraqi flag.

Summer 2008 Trip: The Plan

Like many Peace Corps volunteers, I decorate a sizable chunk of my wall space with maps. Mostly because they’re free, but also because they can be used for other purposes. I have a map of Ukraine that I update shortly after returning from any trip with in the country. I often use my map of Kyiv to study routes to new addresses I need to visit before departing to catch my train for the capital.

I also have a regional map of Europe. It spans from the Iberian Peninsula to the Urals, Lapland to the tip of North Africa. I’ve studied this map intently, repeatedly, during the last year in preparation for the inevitable summer 2008 trip.

My confines: ~25 days of earned travel, the allotted money in my bank account, and a personal vow to travel by boat across the Black Sea to Istanbul.I went through dozens of potential routes before deciding to set out on a western Black Sea loop: from Ukraine to Turkey by sea, then back up through Bulgaria and Romania by land.